Site menu:

My nine-year old Tucker plays AAU basketball for a struggling inner-city team about 30 minutes from where we live. His teammates call him “Shadow” and most times we are the only white family in the gym for games and practice. We (mostly my wife Wendy) haul his (and his sister’s) butt down there three times a week for a couple of reasons, first and foremost because we want him to see that a large chunk of the world looks little like the un-diverse, rural space in which he’s growing up, and, second, because the basketball is just grittier, tougher, faster, played at a different level than in these parts. The gym in which his team plays is 2/3 the size of regulation court with blue-padded stanchions that jut out from the sidelines and become part of the game, and dim fluorescent lighting that depending on the level of sunlight filtering in from the grimy skylights makes the basket a dark target. It’s a no blood-no foul type of game they play, the fundamentals of which are no look passes and under the basket scoop layups which even on a 10-year old level are both beautiful and at the same time difficult to watch. For most of these kids, basketball is a respite from the the difficulties of their lives, lives that are surrounded by poverty, violence and drug use. There are gangs in the middle schools, absent fathers, job layoffs and more, so whenever these kids get the chance, they play, and play, and play some more. And my kids try to keep up.

Tucker has made some fast friends with his teammates. They are sweet, respectful, fun kids to be around. The last couple of weekends, we’ve hosted sleepovers, or more aptly, shootovers as most of the time the sounds of basketballs being pounded by the hoop at the end of the driveway echo through the house. But we’ve also been doing some “field trippy” sort of stuff. A couple of weekends ago, Wendy got their parents to give them a day off of school to go to a statewide GreenFest to have fun but, as is my wife’s way, to get them thinking about the environment. They saw solar cars, learned about organic foods and, at one point, got a lesson on worms. Each of them got a container with some compost, a few poop generating worms, and instructions on how to use them to create great fertilizer for plants. It turned out that for two of the three kids that Wendy spirited off with, it was the first time they had ever held a worm. In the course of the few days they were hanging around with them, we found out all sorts of stuff about their lives and about what they knew about the world, which was, not too surprisingly, not much. At one point when Wendy asked one of them how many people he thought were in the world, he answered “10,000″. The next weekend, we went to “Ringing Rocks” which is this strange little geologic enigma near us, followed by some first-time skipping of stones in the Delaware River near our house. It was an interesting few days of learning for all of us.

There is no doubt that these kids face some pretty difficult futures as a result of circumstances not of their making. It’s pretty obvious they are behind in terms of what they know about the world and their ability to express it well. That’s not an indictment on their schools, per se, as much as it is the inequality that exists in this state and others between the education of the haves and the have nots writ large. But while they say they get “Bs” in school, I can’t help but wonder what that means. No doubt, there learning lives are aimed at what’s on the state assessment, yet they are behind in reading and writing and math. And to be honest, I’m not sure the system can overcome the difficulties present in these kids lives from the start. I don’t think the answer for them is longer school years or teachers getting “merit pay” (or battle pay) as much as it is a fix for the societal problems that surround them. Yet in this moment of steep budget cuts and layoffs, those fixes don’t seem to be on the horizon for them any time soon.

But it’s not just them. Last week I was on a panel with the state assistant commissioner of education where she told the story of seeing the “new” digitally published third-grade “U.S. States” projects, the ones we all did as kids, taking a state of the union and pasting the state bird and state flag and state flower on top of a map with some interesting statistics around it. She asked one young man who did New York State to talk about his slide and he read off all of the stuff. When he got to the population part he said “and New York State has over 19 million people,” and she responded with “Wow! Is that a lot of people?” He looked at her for a moment and said, “you know, I really don’t know.” It was a great example of the context and value that information loses when we fail to teach meaning over memorization.

For Tucker’s friends, for that kid learning about New York, for a lot of kids in this country, it becomes obvious very quickly that we are failing them. Like I said, I know it’s more complex than just blaming the schools and the teachers, which seems to be de rigeur these days, btw. Which is what is so disheartening about the rhetoric that continues to come out of Washington around education; there’s nothing really new. Nothing bold. Nothing that makes me feel like we’ve turned any corner on any of this. We’re arguing about the same old ideas and writing about the same old shifts when the reality is that the lives of those kids on Tucker’s team haven’t changed a bit from all the bloviating going on.

Not suggesting I have the answer here. My frustration just gets more acute when faces and smiles and hook shots come with the statistics.

40 Comments

Thanks for adding to my depression as a frustrated educator. Let me add that the truth is we are not just failing our kids in the low socio – poverty stricken areas, but in average, middle class and affluent areas, as well. My son is less than 25 days from graduation. He’s an honor student who has been accepted into a reputable college. These last lingering days of boredom for him cannot be over soon enough. He has acquired very few, if any, of the skills or knowledge through his public education that afforded him his acceptance into college. In fact, he actually quit both band and soccer in his senior year to allow for more time on the web to teach himself what he was actually interested in learning. Self study is what allowed him to be where he is today, and he says every day, “I wish I didn’t have to go to school so I could actually have more time to learn stuff.” Ironic, huh?

Not to mention my nephew who attends a “private” school and just stated that he’s happy it’s testing week because that way he doesn’t have to sit through boring lessons.

I know it’s not like this everywhere, but it’s more places than not and it’s most disturbing.

Our district is now spending booku bucks on yet another packaged, commercial product that will somehow transform our teachers with “best practices and learning strategies”. I agree it is more of the same. Can’t we just invest in the technology and unleash the real power for learning?

“I know itâ€™s not like this everywhere, but itâ€™s more places than not and itâ€™s most disturbing.”

It’s like that in so many places, I would dare say that there are more schools failing our children than preparing them for the real world. Its sad, but true. But it’s not just the teachers, or just up to our schools. Our students need more, so much more. I too, am a disheartened and frustrated educator looking for answers. I hope that this post will begin the discussion of what we need to do as parents, educators, administrators and communites, to ensure that our children are not being left behind. Though it may not directly affect the ‘haves’, trust me, in the future, if something is not done, it will affect everyone.

Wow! I teach in Northern Canada and I can relate to your story here because our students (aboriginal) have many disadvantages as well. Generally speaking, they do not do well in school and we have problems with high staff turnover and wide spread social problems. We are being reminded that we do not do well on provincial tests and international tests by our division; tell us something we don’t know! The powers that be look at the school as the answer, but we can’t fix economic disparity and we can’t fix social problems. We do help, but we will never be able to equalize the playing field because the playing field is not equal. Your stories of the boys who hadn’t experienced things many of us consider normal illustrates the point so well. I commend you for your efforts on at least raising awareness about the disparity; we need more people talking about how intolerable it should be in North America for kids to be raised in poverty and without hope.

We have lost 5 students in my school alone to suicide since June 2008, we have had numerous attempts, we have had students jailed for serious violent crimes, but government treats the institution like any other! We can spend tens of thousands of dollars to lock our youth up after they commit crimes, but we can’t find some extra funds to try to help them find a path that would be beneficial to us all! Very, very sad!

In my 8th year of teaching following a 20+ year career in the business world, I agree that we have significant problem. The toughest part of my career change has been trying to understand the education “system”. In my view it is the “system” which is the problem. The tools, the admin, the teachers, the students– addressing any of them as individuals will not do it.

Although I may sit alone at the lunch table as a result of my views and teaching methods, I am willing to say that the system doesn’t work. There is no real accountability at any level. Until we are willing to admit that we need to engage in a major overhaul, we are just going through the motions. We move the rubric lower and lower to “create” success.

As a teacher, I do what I can on my own and apply all I know to create a learning environment which is creative, diversified and as relevant as I can. My colleagues at most levels think I am nuts! However, until the system really wants to fix itself, the latest “this ” and “that” will continue to get publicity and accomplish little.

I think you hit the nail on the head. Until we as teachers, are willing to admit that perhaps we need to change, students will continue to fail. It is easy for us to point the finger at others; not so much at ourselves.

Every time I read a post like this I am increasingly grateful for the education my boys received in middle school and high school. I agree completely with Will’s post and the additional comments. It is not just under-privileged kids who are losing out but kids from many socio-economic strata.

I never expected that school would be the only place where my kids would be educated but I did want more of a partner. We opted out of the public school system which was not working for us and sent our boys to a very small, very independent school in Philadelphia where they were taught to learn, encouraged to think for themselves, find and follow their passions, work to make the world a better place and do, do, do. They are currently living less-than-traditional post-high school lives but are still avid learners and constant doers. They have launched a creative collective, are collaborating, performing, publishing and making their marks.

I say all of this not just because I want to brag on my kids (which of course I do) but to point out that all is not lost in education. It may be hidden away in little gems of schools and it may take a great deal of energy, thoughtful planning, deliberate funding and perhaps some family sacrifices but it is possible!

Are we failing our students because of our desperate need to equalize everything in education? Are we not instilling middle class values on families who simply reject these values? When I mentored (BB/BS) in undergrad, I observed parents who were anti school and anti teacher. How can we bounce back from that? They’re the parents, the caregivers, and the ppl ultimately responsible for their children.

Furthermore, in our attempt to equalize, haven’t we lowered the bar for ALL students? That way they can be uneducated together-equally?

I’m afraid I’m being controversial without eloquence today. I’m trying to say something that I think many of us must feel but struggle to verbalize. Am I wrong to worry about this? Is there a better way to look at the circumstances while being completely truthful? (I’m hoping you all have some great responses…)

I concur completely, even if it does make me sad and somewhat ashamed. I think the root cause of these problems is so much more than just within the school or indeed within the home – it’s a cultural shift that needs to take place where we once again have values that celebrate knowledge and achievement and particularly when they are full of relevance. I know from my perspective here in the UK, there is far too much value placed on the mass media and the celebrity/pop cultures. My students genuinely look up to particular “role models” merely because they are on some reality TV show.

There are an awful lot of stakeholders in this mess – and like you, I am not too sure of a solution myself either.

There’s a factor in this equation which is only obliquely mentioned: parental involvement. Education and a love of learning start years before a child steps foot in a classroom. Teachable moments abound in those seemingly mundane childhood questions which occur daily in the preschool years. But more and more parents are delegating those moments to daycare staff who have their hands too full monitoring behavior to develop kids’ naturally scientifically curious minds.

You hit the nail on the head with the phrase “meaning over memorization.” Meaning comes from real-life intersects, like taking kids to see a place they’ve studied, allowing them to touch an artifact at an exhibit or helping them do an experiment to prove to themselves how something works. Not only have we stifled kids’ natural curiosity by equating childHOOD with childCARE, but we’ve attempted unsuccessfully to corral children’s education into a formal school setting. In this, we’ve severely challenged, if not removed, the ability of teachers to create those real-world intersects.

Good education is much more than simply an acquisition or knowledge. As such, it simply cannot happen solely in school. Parents MUST be involved from the earliest days, when learning happens naturally through play and curious exploration, through and including the teen years, as brain development continues and critical thinking skills are shaped and refined.

Reminding us that the key to education is “parental involvement” assumes that poor parents do not love their children and excuses schools from doing all they can to help all children realize the promises of our democracy.

It is not the poor parents who inflict memorization, KIPP or irrelevant curriculum on their children. It is not poor parents who demand that their children be fed a constant diet of test-prep and standardized testing. It is not poor people who have resegregated public schools so that many children of color never encounter a Caucasian classmate.

It is educators who do so, if not by action, then by inaction.

If you feel compelled to tell me that teachers are powerless against such injustice or oppression, please extend half of that empathy towards poor families struggling in our society.

Oh yeah, there is one more thing every educator can do. Pledge to make the 6-7 hours per day children spend with you the best 6-7 hours of their day, regardless of their lives outside of school. The children deserve nothing less.

Parental involvement has nothing to do with economic status or racial background. I attended school in what is still today considered a wealthy district, 99% white, yet many kids of the kids were dirt poor in terms of parental involvement. As laroe pointed out in his comment, the broken system is failing kids at all levels and backgrounds.

Parental involvement, in regards to education, is also not a reflection on a parent’s love for a child but more a reflection on the parents’ value of education, as Chris Best mentioned above.

And I wholeheartedly agree with Will and Robin that it’s not just non-white children who are deprived of benefit when they do not encounter children of other races and socio-economic circumstances. All children naturally assume the whole world is like the world of their experience until shown otherwise. Broadening their horizons by exposing them to what I called “real-world intercepts” involves far more than stuffing them with unrelated facts.

Teachers are far from powerless, as we all know. In fact, all of us – formal school educators or not – have immense power to fight injustice and oppression every day. I do NOT happen to be a teacher by profession myself, but I hold teachers in the highest regard. I volunteer in my children’s school once a week and always joke that it reminds me why I am NOT a teacher!

And by the way, as a parent, I do not expect the 6 to 7 hours a day my kids spend in school to be the best hours of their day everyday. In fact, I hope they often experience frustration, disappointment, conflict, and discomfort – and are then empowered by their teachers at school AND the ones at home (parents) with the tools to learn and grow from those experiences.

I’m from SC and see the same problems. When my school didn’t allow my special ed students to go on field trips, we had weekend field trips of our own. Luckily I had some students and parents willing to carpool. When I took them to Carl Sandburg’s home in NC, I had one student take a whole roll of film of a mountain because he had never seen one before. It seems like we are so busy teaching to the test that we forget about teaching our students things that are relevant to life. I don’t know what the answer is other than to do what you and I are doing and reaching small pockets of students at a time. If there are many who are doing this, maybe we are reaching more students than we think.

Am I weird for reading this and wanting to comment about teaching kids to understand the value of numbers? Everyone else seems to have read this and commented “thank goodness my kids didn’t go to those schools” or “that’s why parental involvement is so important”.

I find this post interesting and I smile because those kids he describes are my kids. The kids I worked with everyday for 33 years and yes, in some ways even my own two sons. Let’s see, kids who live, and have always lived in the inner city, are African American, go to public schools that could be better, oh and yeah, kids who love to play and play and play. Make no mistake life has challenges for them as it did for mine (who had two well educated, financially advantaged and stable parents at home) and can be rough but the children I serve and live with are some of the brightest, creative and resilent individuals I have ever met. I tip my hat to Will who has looked for and found a way to reach in and add some mind expanding experiences to the lives of the children on his son’s team. More should take up the challenge. But kids play and play and play because they are kids, not because they are poor, not because there’s no daddy at home. My mother related many times that she was a child in the depression years in Pittsburgh, Pa and yet she didn’t know just how poor they were until she was grown. Life was hard, but she was a reasonbly happy kid, that’s what mattered. So, what do our eyes see when we look at those “poor kids”? Do we see their circumstances or do we see each of them as a doctor, lawyer or president? I suspect they know what you see and respond accordingly.

I could not agree more, we are failing our kids, we are failing ALL of them. Until we (me and you) decide that we will do whatever it takes change and transform our schools and classrooms into places where children really are first. Where what they learn and how they learn is driven by them and not by a test. Where we expect them to take responsibility for their learning and gladly facilitate that process instead of binding them with lectures, worksheets and lock step grading systems. I have seen the most recalcitrant and stubborn students bloom into thougtful and respectful students because they were given respect, because they were perceived as someone with potential and worth.

So forgive me if I bristle a bit at Will. I believe his heart is in the right place and I commend him for his efforts. His children and those his family touches will be better for what they’re doing. Now let’s get out there and help transform some schools and classrooms. As always, thanks for listening. Leslie

No forgiving needed. You bring a great perspective to this, and I appreciate it. I agree that kids play, regardless of their circumstances. I think what I was trying to suggest is that in inner cities, basketball is seen as a way out, even with very young kids. They dream through basketball, not all, obviously, but many, and certainly these kids. One wants to go to prep school at Oak Hill Academy, just because he knows that is almost a punched ticket to the NBA.

I’ll admit my bias when I look at their futures, though. It does disrespect to some extent the potential of every child. Thanks for pointing it out.

Schools need not replace the elusive “dream of making it in the NBA” with the narrow dream of a specific vocation – even doctor, lawyer or President.

Schools should IMHO offer kids the widest, deepest range of high-quality experiences possible so that learning may result in all of its glorious manifestations.

I learned all sorts of stuff in school – the official curriculum and less “valued” things like computer programming, music composition, jazz improvisation, African American history, etc… None of these experiences resulted in my current career, but they have made me a better citizen and led to a richer fuller life – even if I’m not a lawyer or (medical) doctor. I have yet to rule out becoming President.

I would like to add to the above commenter’s post. I agree with your premise that education is indeed, in many ways, failing our children; I also hope we are not discounting your son’s friends’ lives as ones in which learning is not taking place. You send your son to play basketball with them because you want him to have the kind of learning experience he can have on their court, in their neighborhood. That is just one way in which your son’s friends are having experiences, and learning, in ways that are beneficial for everyone. I bet that they know many things — though they may not be about world population or earthworms — that kids from different kinds of families, and neighborhoods, do not know. Learning, in all its forms, is valuable.

Thank you for reminding us about the big picture. It seems we are in cycle of blame with teachers taking a lot of heat. But the problems many kids are facing come from issues outside of schools and a varied and muli-layered. Fixing one thing doesn’t solve the problem.

As a parent I also related to the idea of trying to raise a child who appreciates diversity in a location where there is little diversity. Thank you for reminding my why I need to be vigilant on that topic.

Thank you for allowing the crying spirit of so many America children vibrate from your voice. And by allowing I mean taking a risk that you didn’t have to take for the sake of engaging the idea of change. I imagine this is nothing new for you. I hear it in the tone of your writing. Funny how having the right motive leads to awakening isnâ€™t it? Iâ€™m grateful for your sharing of yourself, your family, and your space.

I wanted to share this article from the Times the other day. It reflexes on the influence of ones environment on their IQ. It is amazing the pieces of the world that many of our children miss, because those opportunities are not there.

Thank you for sharing and to more people like you and you wife taking the time to help your children cope with today and others.
Keep reminding us….maybe one day we will try something bold and new to engage our children in the “classroom”
Ginny Wallace

There is definitely a huge inequality between the quality of education between the haves and the have nots. I think that this gap becomes particularly clear when you deal with students who are struggling in school. Getting your child the help he/she needs costs upwards of $100/month even if you just go with a local tutor. A learning center like Sylvan costs anywhere over $400/month. Tutoring is simply not an option, and struggling students whose parents cannot afford these steep prices rarely receive any academic support at all.

There are, however, a couple of tutoring companies that seem to be able to offer tutoring at considerably less than $20/hr. A friend of mine recently signed her kid up for TutorJam (www.tutorjam.com), which offers tutoring at under $10/hr and she’s absolutely loving it, but most people I speak with do not seem to be aware that they have these options.

I’ll be interested in seeing how TutorJam fares during this economic crisis.

Once again I am reminded of how systemic our education problems are. There are vast differences in the education being received on either side of town. And why should that be? If we really care about education, we must care about everyone’s education. I want the children on the other side of town to be just as stimulated, engaged, and challenged by school as I wish my 13 year old daughter to be. Unfortunately, while she might be in a better school, her education isn’t much better than “let’s get ready for the tests.”

We truly need to start looking at how we fund school districts, how teachers are chosen for each district, and how we will spend the money. We need it to be more consistent – from neighborhood to neighborhood, town to town, state to state. And we need the decisions to be good ones for our children – not good for the tests.

I teach in an inner city school and agree with so much of what you say here. How about this? Send the kids and the parents to school together.

I also teach a college intro class and some of those adult students have kids in the public schools. The adults are lacking skills and education, so how can they possibly impart it to their kids? It’s time to stop blaming teachers. Invite parents to get their education over again, this time when they might actually appreciate it. Sit next to someone else’s kid. Mentor each other and support each other and develop some self-worth and skills. Just a thought…

Will (and all contributors)
I am always amazed and renewed when I read comments that move beyond the mundane and are heartfelt and well thought out. I am glad that I started to surround myself with a network of educators and people who really do care, strangely enough the largest part of which is digitally based. I am not a parent. I am a pre-service teacher who is less than 30 days from a degree. Being from the midwest, but having traveled the world, the kinds of questions about what progress we have really made in schools concerning diversity, and what getting a “B” really means are really important to me, and I am glad that others are thinking in those veins. I am hopeful that as I join the ranks of education that I can help build something bold and new. I know it is desperately needed. I also know that if in my physical life I lack the mental stimulation that comes with asking these bigger questions, when I read blogs like this and comments from people who do push the issues it makes me feel less apart from the conversation that desperately needs to continue. Thanks to all.

I am a new teacher at a very rural school in North New Jersey. I am currently teaching math at the high school level. I totally agree with you that the system is failing these students. All that we as educators are demanded to do is teach to a standardized tests. Teachers in the middle schools are now accountable as well with the standardized test scores so as soon as 4th grade hits, the students have calculators in their hands. They have no idea what it means to take a percent of something or a discount. Half of my students add on a discount. How is this going to help them in their everyday lives if they are so dependent on a little tool in which more than likely, they are smarter than?

This has been something that is so disheartening for me. When did learning become a chore? I just do not understand why it is so hard for some students to actually try to learn something. They can memorize for a test, but when they are asked to recall something (even from just a week ago), they struggle to do so. I had a student today ask why we have to learn hard, new things? I was dumbfounded when I had to come up with an answer to that question.

I try to infuse technology into my lessons to get my students more motivated to want to learn, but should it take that for them to want to learn? Technology is a great thing to use in the classroom, but you also can’t use it all of the time because then the students will become bored of it. This has created many problems with the teaching aspect of education.

Stretching our minds to learn new things requires practice, patience, and courage. If our students aren’t given the opportunities to use their higher thinking skills, or even worse, aren’t expected to, then they won’t want to take that leap of faith to learn new material. Think of how many adults – intelligent, thoughtful adults – balk at learning to do new things because they are hard. We are failing our kids because we aren’t expecting all kids to think hard and we aren’t giving them the chance to practice.

You are also right that technology is not magic. As educators, if we teach the same way day in and day out we will lose our students. Our lessons must be engaging, with or without technology.

I think that is great that you are allowing your child to experience this. This is what life is all about, helping others to succeed. Some of these kids sound like they need a role model in their life and someone to guide them. I have worked with some at-risk teens in an inner-city setting and have had great rewards and excellent memories in doing this! I do agree also that we are failing our kids in impoverished areas, I am not in an inner-city setting now but in a low-income area where this is an issue. My opinion is though that we can only do so much in school, more needs to take place in the home to help these kids out!